A Hat Never Lies
by marginaliana
Summary: Neville makes an unusual friend.


September 2, 1991 

After about an hour of wandering, Neville managed to find his way to the Headmaster's office and stood, slightly quivering, in front of the gargoyle.

"P-please," he said to it. "I'd like to speak to the Headmaster, please."

The gargoyle suddenly jumped aside. Neville shrank back, then forced himself to leap onto the staircase as it ground slowly upwards. The gargoyle slid closed behind him and he shuddered. As he came to the top of the stairs, Neville found a large, polished door with a heavy griffin-shaped doorknocker. He knocked, tentatively at first. No reply came, and he shuddered for a long moment before working himself up to knock again with more force. After another long moment, he steeled himself and opened the door.

"S-sir?" he inquired, sticking his head inside. But the office was empty. Neville's gaze wandered over the large, sunny windows, the enormous desk that towered almost as high as he was. On the walls between the windows were a large quantity of portraits, most of which merely slept but some of which regarded him with disdain or outright hostility. Neville shrank back and wondered who had opened the door.

"Come in, boy," said a voice impatiently from the shelf over the desk. Neville started and looked up. The Sorting Hat opened the tear in its brim and spoke again. "I rather imagine it is I you wished to speak to in any case."

That wasn't exactly true, but Neville nodded, unable to speak.

"Well," said the hat, "put me on, then. No sense wasting time, boy."

Slowly, Neville crept forward. He had to stretch up on tiptoe to reach the hat, but finally he managed it. As he turned away from the shelf, unbalanced, he tripped over a footstool he hadn't really noticed and barely kept the hat from flying out of his hands. _Oh, no,_ he moaned internally, even as he caught himself on his elbows, the hat several inches from the floor. _If I ruin the Sorting Hat they really will send me home. I'm so useless._

Stifling a whimper, he settled into the visitor's chair with considerable trepidation. He set the hat onto his head.

"There," said the hat's familiar voice in his ear, "that wasn't so difficult, was it? Now what did you want to see me about?"

Neville struggled not to break down in tears.

"I really think you've made a mistake with me, Mr. Hat," he thought, remembering how his first day of classes had gone. First he'd got lost on the way to breakfast, and then again on the way to History of Magic. The other boys in his year seemed to have paired off already into friends – Harry and Ron, Seamus and Dean – and none of the other boys had any time to help, except for that prefect Percy who'd made Neville feel even smaller than ever. In class he'd ended up sitting next to Hermione Granger, who'd looked at him askance for coming in late and then sniffed when he asked to borrow a quill because he'd run out of the dorms without his own. He'd been able to follow the others to the Great Hall for lunch, but none of them had spoken to him other than to ask him to pass the potatoes. In the afternoon they'd all gone to Herbology, which had been rather interesting, but he hadn't been able to muster up the courage to ask any of the questions he'd wanted to, and before he knew it the lesson was over and everyone went off, leaving him alone without even a second thought. "I'm no good as a Gryffindor," he thought. "No good at all."

"If I'm not mistaken, we've already had this conversation," the hat's voice told him with more than a touch of exasperation. "There's more to you, young man, than even you know. You are a Gryffindor. There is no changing that."

"But I'm not brave," Neville thought back. "Not even a little bit. And I don't have any friends, and… and… I want to go home!" He felt the hat shift a little on his head. When its voice came again it was more sympathetic.

"You don't really mean that, do you?" it asked. Neville's lip quivered.

His grandmother had been so proud when he got his Hogwarts letter, and Neville didn't want to imagine how disappointed she'd be if he were sent home. "I suppose not." He sniffed. "But I don't know what else to do. Can't you make me a Hufflepuff instead? I'm _not_ brave, and it'll just be better if people find that out now instead of later. That way they won't have time to have any expectations for me to fail at."

He felt the hat emit what could only be a hat-ish version of a sigh.

"Let me tell you a story," it said. Neville couldn't see how any story could help him, but he'd sat through enough of them at the parties his grandmother had thrown and he knew how to be patient.

"Once upon a time," the hat continued, "before the Founders had even thought of Hogwarts, there was a boy. He was a wizard and he knew it from a very young age because his parents had been magical, but there was no school for wizards then, so he went to school with the other children in his town who were all Muggles. But because wizards were somewhat feared by the Muggles, he had to keep his abilities a secret. Because he was so secretive, though, he didn't have very many friends, you see. Even though he was a perfectly nice person, he had got used to being shy and not drawing attention to himself, and that meant that no one really got to know him. And even when someone wanted to be his friend, he had to guard what he said very carefully not only for his own safety, but for his mother's as well, so he tended not to say very much and after a while the other children his age gave up on him."

Neville found himself nodding. He knew how this sort of story went. Someone would find out the young man's secret and he would have to fight for his life, and all sorts of adventures would follow. That was the way it always went.

"But there you're wrong, Mr. Longbottom," said the hat, and Neville started. He'd forgotten that the hat could hear what he was thinking.

"Sorry," he thought.

"Not to worry," said the hat. "I rather think you'll understand when I'm finished. Because you see," it continued, "no one found out his secret. He kept it very well, as did his mother, and he grew up without any adventures at all."

Neville's brows furrowed.

"Perhaps you don't think he was particularly brave, then?" asked the hat. "After all, it's not very brave just getting up every day and going about your life, even if you do have a secret. After all, what else could the young man do? Really he had no choice. And he didn't even have to work very hard to keep the secret, you see, because he'd been raised to it. It was second nature to him."

"I suppose," Neville thought.

"Perhaps," said the hat, "you might even say he was a bit of a coward, really, because he was too afraid of giving up the secret to make friends. He was too afraid to take a chance on someone. If he had taken that chance, he might have found a friend who was secretly magical as well, or even one that simply wasn't afraid of his magic."

Neville found himself nodding almost in spite of himself.

"That young man," said the hat, "was Godric Gryffindor."

Neville's mouth fell open. "What?" he thought. "How can that be? He was the bravest person ever!"

"He was considered so in his later life," said the hat, "though not necessarily in his own mind. I rather think there was always something of that scared young man in him, even when he managed to overcome his fears in the cause of accomplishing great things."

"But… but…" Neville found even his thoughts were stuttering. Finally he sighed.

"I told you this story," said the hat gently, "because I wanted you to see that the people we think are brave don't necessarily feel brave themselves. And bravery isn't always something that one is born with. For some of us, it must be carefully cultivated. The parts of a person that are unworthy and weak must be pruned away to make room for bravery to grow. And with you, Mr. Longbottom, make no mistake - the seeds of bravery are there within you."

Neville sat still for a long moment absorbing the hat's words. "How do I know you're not just saying all this to make me feel better?" he asked finally.

The hat sniffed. "A hat never lies," it said stiffly.

Neville found himself sitting up straighter. "All right," he said. "All right. I'll be a Gryffindor. I _will_."

Just at that moment the door of the office opened. Neville jumped.

"Ah," said Dumbledore, his eyes alighting on Neville as he shrank back against the wing of the visitor's chair. "The gargoyle let me know that someone had come to visit, but he didn't say who. How are you, Mr. Longbottom?"

"F-fine, sir," said Neville, cursing his stutter. "I… I…" The hat interrupted him.

"We were just having a little chat, Albus. Mr. Longbottom was kindly allowing me to wax nostalgic."

"Lovely," said the headmaster, his eyes twinkling, "I do worry that you get lonely in here all by yourself." Neville watched this exchange with his mouth open, astonished. After a moment he collected himself.

"Y-yes, well," he said, "I'd better go. Homework, you know."

Dumbledore nodded. "Indeed."

Carefully Neville lifted the hat from his head and handed it to the headmaster. He moved to the door and then paused, remembering his manners. He turned, giving the hat a courteous half-bow perfected after years of formal parties. "Thank you, Mr. Hat," he said.

"You're quite welcome, my boy," said the hat, and under Dumbledore's watchful eye, Neville slipped out.

-----

October 13, 1991 

It took Neville a little time to work himself up to going back to the headmaster's office. He'd taken the hat's words to heart and tried to feed and water the feeble shoots of his courage as best he could. He went to his first flying lesson and got on the broom even though he was utterly terrified (the half-hour spent in the hospital wing having his wrist mended wasn't quite the encouragement he'd been hoping for); he regularly tried (and failed) to ignore the barbs Professor Snape flung at him every Friday; and he started forcing himself to sit next to the other first years in the common room instead of hiding away behind his bed curtains. It had worked, to an extent – he managed to get through his classes without doing anything hugely embarrassing, and even though Snape terrified him, the man's cruelty made Neville an object of sympathy rather than derision among the Gryffindors. And though he still didn't think any of the other boys would call him a friend, at least Hermione seemed willing to put up with his company. That was more than he'd managed at home, really.

But now it was Sunday and he was bored and lonely, and almost without thinking he found himself standing in front of the gargoyle again.

"Hullo," he said nervously. "Can I talk to the Sorting Hat again, please?" The gargoyle stared at him impassively for several long moments. Then, just as Neville was preparing to give up, it moved aside to reveal the moving stairs. He stepped carefully on. At the top he knocked.

"Come in," said the Headmaster's voice. Neville opened the door and tentatively did as he'd been told.

"Hullo, sir," he said.

"Mr. Longbottom," said Dumbledore. "What can I do for you? Not back for another argument I hope. One's Sorting is not the sort of thing that can be overturned."

Neville shrank back a little. "N-no," he said. "It's just, well…" He swallowed. "I-I thought I might, um, come again and… and…" He stuttered to a halt, then gulped in a shaky breath and hung his head. "And hear some more stories, maybe, from the Sorting Hat?" He cursed himself for letting his voice squeak out the last few words, then forced himself to look up.

"I thought your story was really wicked," he told the hat directly. Dumbledore looked down at him over the rims of his spectacles but Neville made himself keep looking at the hat. It hadn't made him feel small or stupid the way most everyone else did. After a moment, the tear in the hat's brim curved upwards.

"Very well," it said gruffly, but there was an undertone of pleasure in its voice. The portrait of Dilys Derwent smiled down at him from where it hung next to the hat's shelf. "Put me on again."

Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Unfortunately, I am expecting visitors in a few moments, so I don't think this is really a good time…" Neville felt the tentative smile fall from his face.

The hat made a sniffing noise. "Really, Albus," it said. "You worry too much. Mr. Longbottom and I will just find a nice quiet corner of the castle."

The Headmaster sighed. "If you insist," he said, and shifted the hat down from its shelf into Neville's waiting hands. "I'm sure I don't need to remind you to be careful, Mr. Longbottom."

Neville stifled a feeling of outrage at that statement. He was always careful. Of course, he admitted, often things went wrong anyway. He supposed the Headmaster could only rely on the outward results, though, which didn't speak particularly well for Neville. They never had. He sighed and took the hat from the headmaster.

"I'll be very careful, sir." He settled it onto his head and turned towards the doorway.

"I hoped I'd cured you of self-pity, Mr. Longbottom," said the hat in his mind.

"Sorry, sir," he thought back as he stepped onto the moving staircase. The hat huffed.

"Well, nevermind," it said. "You wanted to hear a story, I believe?"

The combination of Neville's nod and the rotation of the stairs almost sent the hat flying, but his hands flew up and caught it just in time.

"I mean, yes, please," he told it.

"Excellent," said the hat. "Turn left here and go down to the end of the hall. There's a nook there behind that curtain where we shan't be disturbed." Neville did so and found, to his delight, that the curtain hid a padded window seat. He climbed in and pulled the fabric closed behind him.

"Comfortable?" the hat asked. "Excellent. Now, what sort of story would you like?" Neville shrugged.

"Anything, really," he said. "You must know hundreds of them."

"Hmph," said the hat's pleased voice in his mind. "Once upon a time there was a young woman named Gunhilda who came from Gorsemoor."

Neville leaned his head against the wall and smiled.

-----

Neville's visits to the hat continued over the course of the year. He learned about the school years of Mungo Bonham, who'd founded St. Mungo's, and who had apparently discovered his healing skills as a fifth year when another student fell from her broom during a game of Quidditch (Mungo broke her fall and thus was in the hospital wing while she was being healed, which sparked his interest in the profession. He and the other student had been married in the hospital's first year of existence). He learned about Ignatia Wildsmith, who invented Floo powder in a fit of pique because she couldn't Apparate while pregnant.

The hat listened to Neville's stories, too, which were mostly recountings of tales he'd heard in the common room or from his grandmother's friends at parties. He thought those were more interesting than anything that had ever happened to him. But gradually the hat drew out the stories of Neville's own life and childhood – the time his uncle dropped him out the window, the Ministry Ball when he was four when he'd been chased into the fountain by Draco Malfoy. Neville didn't like telling that type of story, but the hat prompted him so subtly he often didn't realize where things were going until he'd started. Other times it asked him about his classes, and he described the fascinating properties of the _Azra microphylla_ or the _Aciphylla horrida_ or whatever they'd learned most recently.

The first time he came back after the Christmas holidays Dumbledore paused in the act of handing the hat down and looked at him with concern.

"Mr. Longbottom," he said, "I am not sure that it is healthy to allow you to continue this association. I am afraid you will dwell in these stories and forget the present."

Neville could think of no response, so he merely looked at the headmaster, confused.

Dumbledore sighed. "Professor McGonagall tells me you don't often play with the other boys in your year. It's important that you make some friends."

"I have friends!" Neville replied, stung. "I _do_. And anyway, the Sorting Hat is my friend, too."

The headmaster pinched the bridge of his nose. "That isn't…" He paused, then finally gave Neville the hat. "Very well. Just keep my words in mind."

Neville left the office, his veins still pulsing with nervous excitement from having stood up to the headmaster. At the bottom of the stairs he remembered to put the hat onto his head.

"Thank you, Mr. Longbottom," said the hat's voice in his mind. "It's been a long time since anyone called me their friend."

"Of course you're my friend," thought Neville. "And, well… maybe you could call me Neville?"

The pleased feeling that resulted from the hat's response stayed with Neville all day.

-----

June 27, 1992 

Neville was not looking forward to the Leaving Feast, not one little bit, and while everyone else rushed to the Great Hall he hung back. What he really wanted was just to hide in his bed until the rest of his life was over, but obviously that wasn't going to work. Instead he stomped down to the Headmaster's office and stood in front of the gargoyle.

"I know Dumbledore's at the feast," he said forcefully. "But I don't care. I'm not leaving until I talk to the hat. You let me in once when I needed it, and you can… you can bloody well let me in again!"

The gargoyle's face remained impassive, but a moment later it slid aside. Neville stomped up the stairs and let himself in without bothering to knock. He scowled at the hat and pulled it down onto his head.

"Oh, dear," said the hat compassionately. "What's got you so worked up? So many exciting things have been happening, I hear."

Neville found his words bubbling up out of the hot mass of anger in his stomach, and he spoke what he'd been thinking all afternoon.

"You lied to me!" he shouted out loud, and the hat flinched on his head. "You said I could be brave, that I'd make friends, that it would be worth getting up every day." Tears welled up and rolled down his face as he banged his fists on the arms of the chair. "But I did it," he blubbered through his tears. "I was brave, and I stood up for myself, and look where it's got me! Harry's in the hospital wing and he saved the world again and all I did was stand in the way. I'm so stupid! I can't even be brave right." He swiped at his eyes angrily.

The hat sighed. "Oh, Neville," it said. "You did what you thought was right."

"What if I'd stopped them?" Neville wailed as his anger drained away as suddenly as it had come. "And then Professor Quirrell would have got whatever he was after and… and… "

"It didn't happen, though," said the hat reassuringly.

"N-no," sniffed Neville. "It didn't. Because Hermione's smarter than me. Everybody's smarter than poor stupid Neville who forgets everything and is fat and slow and worthless and stupid and…"

"Enough!" said the hat sharply, and Neville fell silent. "That's enough of that tedious self-pity from you." Neville sniffed again. "You're not stupid," the hat continued, "nor worthless. You're a boy with a good heart, Neville, and that's the most important thing a person can have. You did what you thought was right," the hat repeated. "That's all any of us can ask of ourselves."

Neville sighed. "I don't think anyone else will see it that way."

"Oh, yes they will," said the hat. "You might have to give them some time, but they will." The hat's tone brooked no argument and by now Neville was too tired to argue any further.

"All right," he said.

"Good," sniffed the hat. "Now get out of here. You're missing the feast and a young man shouldn't go hungry if he can help it."

Neville obeyed and a few minutes later he was slipping into an empty spot at the Gryffindor table. Listlessly, he fidgeted with his fork and tuned out Dumbledore's speech about the House Cup. They weren't going to win it anyway, he knew.

After a moment, though, he tuned in again as the students around him started whispering excitedly. Dumbledore gave points to Ron and Hermione and Harry, and Neville forced himself to smile faintly at the three of them as they were congratulated for their adventure.

Then Dumbledore awarded one final set of last-minute points and Neville's mouth fell open. He couldn't believe that Dumbledore would award him points, not after he'd ignored the headmaster's advice all those months ago. And to award Neville points that put them into the lead, winning the House Cup? It couldn't be real. He felt the blood drain from his face and pinched himself under the table to make sure he wasn't dreaming. Then the boys on either side of him were slapping him on the back jovially and one of the third year girls grabbed him up into a hug and everyone was smiling at him and he felt his mouth stretch into a proper grin.

Dumbledore clapped his hands and the flags and hangings changed to the bright, familiar, Gryffindor colors. A moment later food began appearing on the table and Neville dug in with a hearty appetite. As he looked at his housemates' smiling faces, he sent a silent thought of thanks to the Sorting Hat.

_I'm sorry, my friend, for doubting you,_ he thought. _A hat never lies, after all._


End file.
